Tuesday, January 16, 2007

I get regular page hits from a gateway computer at the Greater London Authority. Do I have a regular reader there? Well, it seems the answer is: sort of. There has been a flurry of activity this morning since someone using that machine to get internet access first read my entry Celebrating diversity.

This is a gateway computer, so will be the route to the internet for a number of computers in the GLA. It looks very much as though details of this post were circulated to a number of people in the GLA, who all clicked through to look at it. I suspect an email then went out to someone with a yahoo mail account, and they came to look. After a short pause, the page hits have started again.

So, why the interest, and who is interested?

The post in question demonstrates that a small number of people - it uses one as an example - can be very vociferous and represent more than one organisation, thereby appearing to represent more voices than is the case - hence the ironic title. It uses photographs that have all been published by other sites to make this example. It suggests that someone who complains about political persecution is a hypocrite if they are a ringleader of political persecution.

I can understand those points being annoying or challenging to professional left-wing and identity group campaigners. These faults - forming endless groups whose memberships are broadly shared to campaign against people in a way they would find intolerable if they were the victims themselves - almost define a certain section of the left, and undoubtedly define identity group politics.

Which brings us to the question of who might be using taxpayer-funded resources at the GLA to monitor my posts. At the moment, I don't know. I suspect I might find out. When I do, I'll be sure to let you know.